CLOUGH ENCOURAGED BY TEAM'S FORM

NIGEL Clough is encouraged by his team’s current form despite the 1-0 FA Cup defeat at Birmingham.

The Brewers manager thought his team had enough chances at St Andrew’s “to have won three games” but takes heart from the fact that, finishing apart, it was another good performance.

“We are sufficiently encouraged. Our performances have been good recently and it was the same again against Birmingham where we played some very good stuff, it was just the frustration of not being in the hat for the next round. We created more chances at Birmingham than in our three away victories on the spin. We are have settled to a pattern of play currently that we are very comfortable with. The team is almost picking itself.

“It’s a lesson for us for the rest of the season that as well as you play, if you don’t get a goal you can lose games.”

The other downside of the game was an injury for Will Miller, who got a dead leg in a challenge just before half-time.

Clough said: “We will have to see how it settles down. Sometimes these injuries can go solid and he might not be able to move it, other times it can easy quite quickly.”

Miller was replaced by Joe Sbarra at half-time and Clough was quick to praise the youngster who he says makes it harder for him to bring in new faces in the transfer window.

“We know if we bring someone in we have to get better than Joe. You look at the impact he had coming on and we have to get someone better if we want to displace him in the squad.”